Gun Control

While the vast majority of Americans do back modest efforts to curtail the availability of guns or shore up gun safety, the specific proposal O'Rourke is emphasizing divides the public's support.

"It does not take much imagination to conjure up the enormous harm that can result from the combination of illegal firearms, explosives, and drone aircrafts," prosecutor William McSwain said in a press release.

The vagueness of the retailers' statements and carefully-worded avoidance of the use of the term "ban" have become something of a Rorschach test.

"I want to take everyone back to one of the earliest attempts at mass confiscation of firearms in the United States," Loesch said. "And that was Wounded Knee."

"Our nation's greatest asset, our children, are the innocent victims of gun manufacturers' greed enabled by their corrupt lobby and our elected whores," Barry Schapiro wrote.

The topline proposal, perhaps the bill's most controversial, would establish a "full registry" of gun license holders.

O'Rourke has become a champion for mandatory buybacks of assault weapons, such as AR-15s, that have been used in many recent mass shootings.

"The NRA must prove beyond all shadows of doubt or accusations that we are squeaky clean," Nugent wrote.

During the third Democrat debate, O'Rourke made a rousing plea to ban the possession of certain military-style rifles, such as the AR-15.

Still reeling from the mass shootings in Odessa and El Paso, the former Texas Representative told the Democratic debate crowd he would go beyond optional buybacks.

At least one NRA director privately expressed concerns about the alleged extravagance of the Alaska trip.

Those who've yet to support a ban showed pause due to concerns about the bill's details, believed it was a hopeless task — so long as the Senate is GOP controlled — or simply did not want to discuss the matter.

But the application of this bill, should it pass the Senate and be signed into law by President Donald Trump, an uncertain prospect unto itself, may leave behind perpetrators of hate in various parts of the country.

GOP members indicated that, while they may support certain gun violence prevention measures, they're unwilling to take action without support from Trump because efforts would be futile to only be defeated by a presidential veto.

"So, let's save time. Let's just get it done — now," the speaker of the House said.

The NRA's political arm repudiated Patrick's comments, likening them to "Bloomberg-funded failures that were attempted under the Obama administration."

"We join a growing chorus of businesses in requesting that our customers, other than authorized law enforcement personnel, do not bring firearms into our stores," CVS wrote in a Twitter post Thursday.

The findings also reveal a relationship between media coverage of mass shootings and resulting legislative action.

Political leaning caused divides among students when it came to concealed carry and certain firearm-related bans.

As some call for a boycott of Walmart, Dick's Sporting Goods — which stopped selling guns and ammunition in 135 stores — has seen a 3.2 percent rise in profits this year.

"Side note: With universal background checks, I wouldn't be able to let my friends borrow my handgun when they travel alone like this," Dan Crenshaw tweeted.

"We know these decisions will inconvenience some of our customers, and we hope they will understand, Walmart CEO Doug McMillon wrote in a memo Tuesday. "As a company, we experienced two horrific events in one week, and we will never be the same."

While it's unclear what exactly caused the 36-year-old to fail a background check, records indicate he had previously been arrested for evading arrest and criminal trespass in 2001.

"I said several weeks ago that if the president took a position on a bill so that we knew we would actually be making a law and not just having serial votes, I'd be happy to put it on the floor."

Coulter on Sunday weighed in on a Twitter discussion about gun control in the wake of Texas' second mass shooting during August.

"The problem is not the absence of laws. It's an absence of morality," former police officer Tony Perkins said.

"We don't have more 'crazy' or 'mentally unstable' people in the US," Stanley tweeted. "What we DO have are commonplace mass shootings with automatic and semi-automatic high powered firearms."

Texas Republican congressman Matt Schaefer railed against Americans calling for lawmakers to "do something" about mass shootings, arguing via Twitter Saturday that God and prayer are more effective than gun control regulations.

An impassioned Beto O'Rourke told CNN's Dana Bash Sunday the epidemic of U.S. gun violence is "f***ed up" just one day after the second mass shooting in less than a month in his home state of Texas.

Reversing a Washington norm, gun control groups spent more on lobbying during the 2018 midterms than the NRA did